


Is This Body a Home?

by Gwendolynn_C



Category: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood & Manga
Genre: Agender Alphonse Elric, Agender Character, Gen, Gender-Neutral Pronouns, Non Binary Alphonse Elric, non binary character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-15
Updated: 2016-07-15
Packaged: 2018-07-24 02:02:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,354
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7489014
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gwendolynn_C/pseuds/Gwendolynn_C
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It's not that he dislikes his body, he just doesn't recognize it.<br/>And it's not that he doesn't like being a man, he just doesn't fit into it.<br/>And it's not that he's never felt this way, it's just that now he has a chance to think about something other than keeping himself and his dumb older brother alive.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Is This Body a Home?

**Author's Note:**

> Because this story is about Al discovering their gender and because I've written it in the present tense, Al's pronouns change partway through the story. Please remember to always use the proper pronouns for people in real life, even if you're referring to a time prior to them transitioning or coming out.
> 
> It's Non-Binary day and I saw a Brotherhood gifset on my tumblr dash and the thought of non-binary Al just wouldn't leave me alone. It's my new headcanon.

Alphonse Elric spent _years_ fighting to get his body back. After years inhabiting a cold, hollow suit of metal like a void with a voice he expected to feel happier once he returned to his body. Perhaps he needs to rephrase that, he is happier – he loves eating and sleeping and sitting outside feeling the wind and rain and heat and humidity against his skin. And he’s so grateful. He’s grateful to everyone who helped him in his journey, especially to those who lost their lives, especially to his brother. Brother. It’s a word that held so much meaning to him for so long but now feels clunky and odd and tastes bitter in his mouth.

Do words always carry a taste? Or is that just something else he forgot about while he was bodiless? Can you taste through your ears? Or is that tiny chill that runs down his spine when he hears words like “strong young man” just a side effect of being able to hear with his ears again instead of processing words abstractly.

He’s grateful for his body. He shouldn’t want it to any different than what it is, right?

He spends a lot of time with Winry and it’s like they’re kids again. Nothing can harm him because Pinako is watching over them and Edward too and all of their other friends. Nothing bad is going to happen to them again (he had forgotten about nightmares. Some nights he thinks that the nightmares are not worth having a body). On long afternoons when Al’s body, rundown from years of disuse, is feeling achy and weak, Winry keeps him company. She has exactly three dresses in her closet and she doesn’t wear them often, but she lets Al try them on. The soft fabric slips through his fingers like water and while they hang off his skinny frame poorly, he likes the way they swish around his thighs.

“Is this wrong?” Al asks hesitantly, carefully hanging Winry’s dresses back in her closet.

“What do you mean, Al?”

“I mean… I’m a boy.”

“We’re just having fun, Al. It’s like playing pretend.”

And that makes him feel better. It’s just playing pretend, like when they were kids and pretended to be pirates. Not recognizing his own skin, his own face and imagining a softer one is just playing pretend. Waking up from dreams of blood and end times and imagining going into town while wearing a dress, that’s just playing pretend. Sniffing every single flower in a field while thinking about the fact that plants have over 50 genders and what a shame it is that humans only have two, that’s just playing pretend.

He’s not a girl. Girls are fantastic but he can’t imagine fitting into a girl shaped space. But the boy shaped space feels just as constricting.  He thinks of Envy, despicable creature that he was, but who could change his form as the drop of a hat. Is it evil of him to be envious of that?

He reads. He travels. He eats so much food and smells everything and probably touches more things than he should – in his first week back in his body he burned himself four times. He learns. He learns about different kinds of people. Al has always been curious about people but there wasn’t always time to really meet anyone or ask questions when he and Ed were getting their bodies back and saving the world.

There are people of all kinds of bodies who dress in all different types of ways. There are more words for more realities than he ever thought possible. It’s a discovery that sets his pulse racing.

He writes Ed and Winry letter after letter after letter describing all of his findings. Some of the letters are about Xingese delicacies, some of the letters are long descriptions of the weather because he’s still not used to it and a lot of the letters are about gender. He wonders if Ed and Winry notice. They don’t comment on it when they write back, but they don’t not comment on it either.

 _Your friend sounds like a lot of fun, Al._ Ed wrote, _aren’t humans amazing? An animal will just live their life as an animal, some don’t even notice if you name them. Humans like to make things more interesting. I like that. I like how diverse we can be._

* * *

It becomes a secret burning inside them, hot like the Eastern desert. Some days it’s like a million butterflies in chest and they can’t help but grin. Some days it’s like they’ve swallowed a boulder and they can’t help but cry. Every day they wait and wait and don’t breathe a word because they wants to see Ed’s face when they tell him. They wants to hear Winry’s voice when she reacts.

They go home, to the Rockbell’s that is, it’s been home to them since they were a child and that doesn’t stop now. Pinako leaves Ed, Winry and Al to clean up after dinner while she goes to smoke a pipe before bed. After the kitchen is sparkling, they all sit out on the front steps and look at the sky.

Al takes a deep breath and starts talking, everything tumbling out of their mouth a bit too fast as their heartbeat picks up. They explain agender and they explain liking their name but hating their pronouns and they explain clothing a little and they explain social dysphoria a lot. Ed’s smile is a bit crooked, he’s doing that thing where he pretends to be nonchalant just so he won’t worry Al.

“After everything we’ve been through.” Ed says, stretching his arms over his head until his joints crack. “I’m just happy we’re all alive and safe. Whatever makes you happy Al, you’re still my little broth-”

He stumbles. Al takes pity on him and smiles.

“I still like the word brother.” They say. “But I’m not a man, I’m a person. And I’m a ‘they’ not a ‘he’, okay?”

Ed nods and smiles for real this time. “Like I said, you’re my little brother. Whatever makes you happy is fine by me.”

“Me too Al.” Winry says, her voice overflowing with kindness as pulls him into a tight hug that’s only slightly awkward because they’re sitting side by side. “I love you.”

Al grins and looks up at the stars. The sky looks different in Amestris. They continue to talk about Ed’s life and Winry’s and their life together. They gossip about Pinako and the Hughes’ and the Armstrongs and other shared friends. Winry leaves to go to sleep, warning them not to stay up to late.

Ed is relating a tale about a stray dog stalking him on his way home from the butcher. Al interrupts him.

“Do you really mind?” They ask.

“Al. We’re brothers.” Ed says, like it’s the only thing that matter. And he’s right.

They remember all the times they’ve used that word. Shrieking it over broken bodies, desperate for the other to stay alive. Screamed through vast crowds, desperate to find one another. Shouted during moments of jubilation, desperate to celebrate despite their sorrows. Whispered during embraces, desperate to have their happiness last.

“We’re brothers.” They repeat.

They had a hard time believing it at first, that it was going to last: the peace, the contentedness and the joy. They felt like they had to grip their body tightly, like it was a bar of soap, likely to slip out of their grasp at any second. Their nightmares were plagued with visions of the homunculi resurrecting and terrorizing those he loved.

For the first time since the third of October, all those years ago, they feel like they can settle into existence without worry. They were themselves, nothing else. They were a brother and a friend and lover and thinker and traveler and reader of books and writer of letters and taster of foods. They were a klutz who got sick too often and had difficulty controlling the volume of their voice. They were happy and they were free.


End file.
